I actually own the TrendNet and use it on an Intel PC stick / candy bar with zero issues. The StarTech looks dirt cheap and attractive also, but did not research their Nexus Player compatibility.
Definitely need / want hard-wired Ethernet on any / all video devices. My Nexus Player is hooked up to a spare monitor so I can configure and try it out, and has a weak WiFi signal and thus slow performance overall. The firmware update of 187 MBytes took a very long time to download, and the overall Nexus performance is quite sluggish. I expect this to improve drastically once I get the Ethernet connected, since the Intel Atom Quad Core inside the Nexus is a powerful CPU. YouTube and other feeds on WiFi stall the Nexus occasionally, and this is the wrong way to assess the Nexus and itsTablo performance.
All I can say at this point, using WiFi, is that the Nexus in general and the Tablo in particular look very nice and especially easy to use by SWMBO, who like me is anxious to regain a stable and trouble-free player for Tablo. So far, very goodā¦
I might have told you this before, but make sure you keep going back and checking for more Firmware updates. There will be about 4-5 in a row. Once you hit 6.0 Marshmallow you should be good. Might want to move it closer to the router to get it all configured if the downloads are taking a long time. It definitely gets more stable with each update.
Installed a hard-wired Ethernet using a TrendNet adapter borrowed from my Intel candy bar iTunes server. Updated to latest 6.0 Android OS.
Gave the Nexus a workout with Tablo. My observations:
The Nexus and Tablo work really well together, with smooth, fast navigation, playback, and guide browsing. No hint of pauses, stalling, video artifacts, etc. Video rendering quality is quite good but below the Roku when critically viewed, not a big deal.
There are no issues of any consequence. Unlike using the Roku 3 since Aprilās firmware mess, using this player is a pleasure. Makes the Tablo show its strengths and excellent user experience.
No doubt a good WiFi signal would permit wireless users to enjoy a similar experience. At $45 along with all the Roku grief, the Nexus would be a natural replacement for the Roku except for lack of Livestream, a channel I must access which Roku has and Nexus does not AFAIK.
Thanks to all here for suggesting and assisting with this great Nexus substitution.
Do you mean the Livestream app? Itās not ideal, but the app (at least the Android one) has Google Cast support so you could use it with the Nexus Player.
Yes, sorry for typo, I do need Livestream, but did not see a Nexus Player app available. I assume you are referring to casting to the NP from another Android device, which I do not have, but maybe some other sidecar type method?
Yes that is what I meant. Hmm, you might try checking their website (they have one, right?) to see if there is a Chromecast icon in the web Player. If not, you could download the Google Cast Chrome Extension on a computer and cast the entire tab to the Nexus Player. Performance on that wonāt be quite as impressive, but it works - thatās how I watch The Profit on CNBC.com every week.
I also emailed the developers and they said Android TV support is a very popular request and the developers are considering adding it.
There are a few different options. Let me know if any of these work.
That is my observation of the Fire TV video player as well - which I think is exactly the same as the Android player.
On the plus side however, the Fire TV Tablo App has performed more or less perfectly throughout all the Roku drama.
Which shows that there are multiple āTablosā at work in a session. The code that sits on the Tablo itself, the code that sits in the Roku app, the code that sits in the Android app, etc. There is not a single point that one can say āThat is the Tablo.ā In fact the antenna, the cables, the splitters, the router, etc. are as much a part of āthe Tabloā as is its CPU.
Thatās not the case with some other DVRs where one can point at the box and say, āThere it is.ā
Do you have the 1st or 2nd gen FTV? I have the 2nd gen FTV and I did find the video quality is on par if not better than the Roku 3. As for the NP, I can tell itās not as good as Roku and FTV.
Iām just talking about the video quality here. The picture is general richer and has better saturation on the Roku and FTV (2nd gen) than the NP. Beside that, the NP is a very capable box that has native android, even though I think the FTV has better build quality overall.
For what itās worth, I didnāt notice any change in video quality switching from Roku to Android TV, but I wasnāt viewing them side by side or immediately afterwards to compare. Usually I am relatively attentive to visual and audio quality. The picture on the Nexus Player still looks awesome to my eyes. Now I want to do a comparison between the Shield TV and the Nexus Player to see if the picture is identical.
1st gen Fire TV boxā¦and also have 1st gen Fire TV stick (but my comment is regarding the box, as that is what Iāve primarily tested with).
Very oddly, I think the video player is smoother with the Fire TV stick, when I was testing with it, especially for the 60fps content. I had inquired to Tablo regarding this and they did confirm that the decoders are different.
TabloTVOct 5
The stick & box actually have slightly different decoders. (This is on the Fire TV firmware itself, not Tablo.) So itās not crazy to see different behavior on them.
.
Ok. So I have upgraded to 6.0 for the Nexus Player. Uninstalled the Tablo app, reinstalled the Tablo app, Connected to my Tablo, andā¦I see all my channels but no guide information. I see a spinning circle in the top right corner. I cannot scroll down on my channels, but I can select down off the screen and actually select a channel that is not visible and live TV will display (Itās a crap shoot on what channel I select considering I have gone past the bottom of the screen.)
I select My recordingsā¦nothing but blue
I select TV showsā¦nothing but blue
I select Moviesā¦nothing but blue
I select Sportsā¦nothing but blue
What seems to be the problem? My Tablo is at version 2.2.7. I was hoping to get the 2.2.8 drop, but I still have not seen it. I am having no issues seeing the guide or recordings on my two Roku 3s. I see the guide and all my recorded shows.
@Scott_Gaboury - Very odd. First try rebooting router > Tablo > Nexus and see if you can get things communicating correctly. If not, send us a note and weāll see why things arenāt behaving.
Thanks for the recommendations. I will check them out. Near term, I am hoping to keep my 6 Roku 3 boxes as the Tablo player solution, subject to the firmware release of 2.2.7 or whatever they may call it, 2.2.8, which a couple people have reported as being āTHE SOLUTIONā we Roku owners have been waiting for since April. This Nexus Player is just a fall back so that I need not spend the winter with a tempermental Tablo player.
Having watched the Nexus and used it further beyond the first hour I reported earlier, I have found some of the same sloppy programming issues as the Rokus, namely, icons stuck on the Tablo recordings page which cannot be deleted or played, different recordings listed on the Nexus versus the Roku versus the iPhone, some navigation which gets lost trying to select an episode, etc.
Hate to repeat myself from the 600 message Roku reboot thread but software which works some of the time for some of the people is the definition of crummy software. Every player I have tried, Amazon Fire, Roku, Nexus are riddled with bugs, and of all of them the iOS app seems least buggy. Thankfully the Nexus bugs essentially disappear while actually viewing Tablo content, whereas the Roku has a nearly unusable player especially since LPWs arrived.
